


Goldminer

by littleloonlost



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-13
Updated: 2015-08-13
Packaged: 2018-04-14 14:00:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4567182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleloonlost/pseuds/littleloonlost
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for oxfordsplice, for the prompt: "A story with Tywin and Myrcella. I’d love to know what each thinks of the other."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Goldminer

When Cersei birthed a daughter, Tywin Lannister’s first concern was that his daughter would strive to raise the child in her own image.

That would not be allowed to happen. 

With Jaime a sworn, if soiled, Kingsguard and Tyrion half a monster, Cersei’s children were the only hope for the Lannister legacy. It was not ideal. Once or twice Tywin even questioned his decision not to take a second wife. But regrets and complaints were for men who did not have the strength to do what needed to be done.

He could not see any difference in appearance between the infant and her brother at the same age. He searched, as he had with the newborn Joffrey, for some legacy from Joanna in the baby’s features. Once again, all he could see was puffy pink skin and wisps of fair hair. He frowned at the frailty of it.

Joffrey was trying to get Tywin’s attention, swinging his wooden sword and making increasingly shrill noises that were presumably intended to impress his grandfather.

It was tiresome.

“Father, look,” Cersei said, with a yawn. She ought not to let people see her looking so tired, especially not the King. “Joff wants to show you how he defeats his enemies.”

The baby opened her eyes suddenly. He shook off the impression that she was looking right at him.

In frustration, the little prince reached into the cradle and pinched the baby as hard as his little hand could.

“Joffrey!”

The little boy scowled, then Tywin watched him decide to begin crying.

Wrapped snugly in her blanket embroidered with stags and crowns and lions, the baby did not cry. She watched.

Tywin Lannister did not smile, ever. On occasion, he frowned slightly less deeply.

*

After seeing Cersei safely wed to Robert and carrying an heir, Tywin avoided King’s Landing for a time. The smallfolk would not soon forget the sacking of the city, in spite of the fact that they would all have burned if he’d let them; nor did Tywin find many friends among the lords and ladies fawning over the new King. Tywin did not look for friends for their own sake. Allies, however, seemed to prove more faithful if they thought of themselves as such.

More importantly, it was time that the Lord returned to Casterly Rock. The Seven Kingdoms were as secure as they could or should be until his grandson sat the throne. The priority now was to see that his own house was in order, and that the armies of the Westerlands were ready.

He visited the capital every few years. His presence was enough to remind his good-son that he owed him money, and that provoked the King into demanding all manner of extravagant diversions; feasts and tourneys and dancing girls; all hot, colourful and bloody displays of wealth and power. At first Robert draped Cersei with silks and jewels and kissed her in front of the cheering crowd. As the years went on, the silks were finer and the jewels were larger, but the Queen bought her own.

Before he returned to Casterly Rock, Tywin met Jon Arryn in the Tower of the Hand to agree terms for the next loan.

It was something of an inconvenience when one year Cersei announced that, instead of welcoming her father to King’s Landing she and her attendants and the children would be paying a visit to Casterly Rock.

Joffrey enjoyed having a new range of men to run ragged, his lack of improvement at arms being of course their failure. At one stage Tywin thought he might lose his master-at-arms. Cersei laughed at how tiny Tommen chased after his brother, though it seemed to Tywin that the younger boy was most often running away. Only Myrcella had questions about the castle and its history, and that of the House whose name she should have borne. 

He came across her one day, sitting alone beneath a portrait of Joanna with the infant Cersei and Jaime. She had a book on her lap, filled with stories of the Kings of the Rock. Surely she could only be looking at the illustrations.

She closed the book when his shadow fell over her and her face spread in a smile as beautiful as her mother’s had ever been.

“She’s pretty.” She meant the portrait.

“She was. Yet she died giving life to Tyrion, if you can credit it.”

Either the child did not pick up on the disgust in his tone or it did not put her off, for she came and put her arm around his leg. He side-stepped abruptly.

“Was she like Mama?”

“No.” He sat down and motioned for Myrcella to sit too. He stiffened with surprise when, still looking up at the portrait, she lay her head against his knee. “She was hardly at all like your mother. Or your mother was hardly like her.”

The girl still looked like a doll, with the golden curls and big eyes and the gowns picked out for her by a servant. He did not know what a child of that age might be expected to understand, but he had always demanded the highest of man, woman or child. That way they could let him down, but he did not let them down.

“The trouble with Cersei is that she thinks if she had been a man, the world would have fallen at her feet. The truth is, if she had been a man, she had better have been damned good with a sword, or someone would have killed her long ago.” He hesitated, wondering if the curse or talk of swords would have frightened her, but she looked only curious. “Women are forgiven things men are not. Men believe women to be more innocent. Weaker. You must never be weak, Myrcella, no matter how innocent you are. Your grandmother could have explained this better…”

She looked confused. Impatience gnawed at Tywin’s temples. Joanna had known what he meant when he spoke, even often when he did not. Joanna had been a Lannister through to the bone, bones now long underground and being pushed deeper with the weight of Casterly Rock and Lannister history bearing down.

He tried to explain. “Your mother… and your uncle… they might have been different today if Joanna had lived.”

Myrcella turned to look at his face as her own scrunched up, taking that in. He waited for her to ask how they might have been different. He already knew he was not going to answer that question.

She asked, “Would you have been different, Grandfather?” 

“No,” he said finally. “Joanna would not have wanted that. Now, your mother will be wondering where you are.”

Tywin dismissed Myrcella’s septa and installed one who appeared to have at least a half-ounce of sense, with instructions as to the history and geography he wanted the child to know the next time they met. The interest he had taken in Jaime’s education had been wasted time, but perhaps if Cersei knew a fraction as much about the world as she thought she did, he would have more faith in the family’s future.

*

The following year found Tywin back in King’s Landing.

The King had decided he wanted to reduce the size of his armies, or increase the size, or disband them altogether and send them off to whore and hunt on someone else’s coin, and this time Jon Arryn needed reinforcements to help the King make up his mind.

The armies of the west would be increasing. Tywin did not particularly care what happened to the rest. The visit would, however, give him the opportunity to check upon his cubs.

No one appeared to greet him when he arrived in the Red Keep. There was a sound of distant wailing, which he did not understand. No bells were ringing, so it seemed unlikely anyone of consequence was dead.

Something squished beneath his boot. The texture reminded him of battle. It was only an animal, the entrails to be precise. 

A kitchen maid ran past and squeaked in alarm when she saw him. He imagined the creature whose entrails were stuck to his boot might have sounded similar when it died.

“Beg pardon, milord. I – I – it was the prince, milord – not that it was his fault – I’m ever so sorry, milord, I’ll have the floor cleaned at once.”

“Clean my foot, woman!”

She squeaked again and nearly hit the ceiling. 

His boot wiped on her apron, he carried on until he found the majority of his family, screaming at the top of their lungs. It was not what he would consider a roar.

Robert swung for Joffrey, who squalled in a tone nearly indistinguishable from his mother’s, who was beating at Robert’s arm, all the while Tommen ran around the room, his face surely twice the size it should be and red as his banner, tearing at his fair hair.

Tywin stepped back sharply until he was out of the room. He glared at a servant. “Take me to my quarters.”

His ears still rung from Tommen’s shrieking. Tywin did not blame Robert for striking Joffrey, though the room had seemed to shake from the impact, but he could not understand why the King was not equally dismayed by the cowardly display of his youngest.

Climbing the stairs, he nearly walked into the servant’s back as the man hesitated. He growled in disappointment to see Myrcella with her face buried in her lap, shaking with sobs. He had had quite enough of extravagant displays of emotion and family weakness, and he had not even changed his clothes.

“Shh, child,” he said, with a tap on her shoulder.

She took a deep breath and looked up. “Joff killed a cat. He slit it open and killed its kittens. All it ever did was stop mice spoiling our food.”

Tywin sighed, and waved the servant away. There was no need for this to be more of an exhibition than it already had been.

“It was a cat. You are a _lion_. Lions shouldn’t be afraid.”

Myrcella laughed, more bitterly than a child should.

“I’m not _afraid_. I’m angry.”

Tywin’s eyebrows twitched.

He pulled Myrcella to her feet and marched her up the stairs, less to avoid prying ears and more because she had to learn to stand up.

“You are a Lannister of Casterly Rock and a royal princess of the House Baratheon. You are born of the realm’s two most powerful families. You are beautiful and beloved, but be under no illusion, you will have enemies, many of them, ordinary men and women twisted by envy and greed and ambition. They will want your beautiful blood.”

Myrcella’s mouth hung open. Her tears had dried.

“You are a lion, ch- Princess. If you show them that you are not afraid of them, they will be afraid of _you_.”

She looked unsure. His children were an ingrate, a fool and a dwarf, his grandsons a bully and a craven. Uncertainty was the best he could hope for.

“Joffrey will be King one day. If you let him best you now, imagine what he’ll do then.”

Myrcella frowned and in doing so resembled him as much as any of his descendants ever had.

“Joffrey’s not better than me.”

He shook his head. “There’s more to it than that. You need to be strong to deal with those who would do you harm, Myrcella. Always strong. They will seize on a moment of weakness.” He shook her shoulder. “I’m not saying you can never cry. But you can never cry when people can see.” He sighed heavily. “And you must remember, they are always watching you.”

She reached to clasp his hand on her shoulder.

“I love you, Grandfather.”

 

*

End


End file.
